Hot Blood and Cold Steel
by PromisedSword
Summary: Who is Kara Shepard? A hero. A badass. A loose cannon. She has been called many names. But who is she really? What is her story? This is an account of the real Kara Shepard and her crew, the stories not told on galactic news.  Shepard/Garrus
1. Blur

**Hot Blood and Cold Steel: The Kara Shepard Chronicles**

**AN: **This is a collection of mostly unrelated drabbles and one-shots about my primary Shepard. The subject matter ranges from retold scenes from the games (which may be a little different due to artistic license), scenes I wish had happened in-game, scenes set after Mass Effect 2 (only speculation so far, of course), and any other parts of Shepard's 'untold' story I feel like writing. Reviews and concrit are welcome, but remember to be polite! :)

Rated for language and violence, though there may be some mild sexual content later on.**  
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**1) Blur**

"End of the line, Vasir." Kara leveled her Locust SMG at the asari Spectre's head, staring down at her across the deserted rooftop cafe. Liara's biotic blast had knocked Vasir away from the hostage she had taken, though Kara had had to lose her heavy weapon ammo as the price for leaving the human woman unharmed. "You've got nowhere else to run."

"I don't think so." Vasir said, her voice steady even as dark blue blood dripped from her side. A familiar biotic corona flared up around her. In the blink of an eye, she was across the roof, an assault rifle in her hands. "Come and get me, if you can!" She called back across the distance.

Garrus cast a weighted look at Kara in the wake of the other Spectre's jump. "Look familiar, Shepard?" he asked.

Kara holstered her submachine gun and drew the Claymore shotgun into her grip as an answer, a signal to anyone who had fought beside her what her intention was. Her usual manic grin took its place as the three of them advanced on Vasir's new position. "Things just got interesting, Garrus." She responded. Then the same blue light surrounded her, and she was gone.

Garrus settled into an L-shaped section of cover, sniper in hand. Liara knelt beside him, her pistol held loosely as she gaped at Kara's reappearance right in front of Vasir, the physical shock that knocked the other Spectre back accompanied by the crack of shotgun fire. Kara's laughter drifted back to them.

"Shepard!" She called, though Kara was out of range to hear her. Liara turned to Garrus. "What was that?"

"Biotics," he replied.

"I know that!" Liara was clearly confused. She had traveled with a Shepard who was a soldier trained purely in combat, born without biotics. "But why does she…?"

"Cerberus," was all he said. "She came back like that."

Although Garrus was speaking to Liara, his eyes never left the twin streaks of light now chasing each other across the rooftop, his rifle gripped tightly, making sure he would be ready should Shepard need him. The whoosh of air as the two Spectres darted around each other was punctuated only by the crack of shotgun rounds or the staccato burst of rifle fire and, every so often, Kara's laughter carried by the wind to their position.

"We can't just sit here!" Liara said. "She needs our help!"

Garrus shrugged, his mandibles relaxed in a turian smile. "Be my guest; I'm as likely to hit Shepard as I am Vasir with them fighting like this. Besides," he watched Vasir go flying as Shepard broke through her barrier, "I think she's got it covered."

Liara watched, mouth slightly agape, as Vasir staggered back to her feet, wiping blood from her lips, only for Kara to haul back an arm and punch the asari straight in the face.

"Eat it!" Kara yelled, calling up her biotics to charge Vasir again from point blank range. But just as she blurred, so did Vasir, and by the time Kara hit the empty space where the other Spectre had been, Vasir was streaking toward where Garrus and Liara were crouched watching the fight.

"Garrus!" Kara yelled as she reappeared, realizing almost immediately what was happening. "Liara!" But she was temporarily drained, unable to call forth the power to jump again. Though she had already broken into a run, she would not reach them in time.

"Move!" Liara commanded Garrus, the turian scrambling to comply, jumping over the small walled garden he had been squatting beside, even as Vasir slammed into the bricks where he had just been.

But Liara had not moved, and for a moment of stillness, the two asari stared each other down, only meters from one another. Vasir raised her assault rifle. And a vortex of dark blue sprung up around her.

Liara backed out of range of the singularity she had created, firing off a couple shots with her pistol for good measure. Vasir struggled to move away, but she was trapped in the biotic gravity well, the density stripping off her layer of protective armor inch by inch.

Garrus aimed the sniper rifle, and fired off two rounds that broke through the last of Vasir's armor, even as Liara's singularity vanished.

Vasir swung around to face him, fury in her eyes, bringing up her weapon to bear vengeance on her new target. And Kara, like a blue comet, slammed into her from behind.

Without any protective defenses, the speed of Kara's charge flung Vasir bodily across the other half of the roof, tumbling end over end. She lay there for a minute, stunned but not dead.

Kara advanced on the downed Spectre, purposefully but not too quickly. Even as the asari rose to her knees, upright but bent over, Kara closed the distance. She stared down at the badly-wounded Spectre, no longer grinning after the close call her teammates had had.

"You shouldn't have tried to play the biotics game with me, bitch," she said, as Vasir staggered to her feet. "I'm the best damn Vanguard in the galaxy." And with one last blast from the Claymore, Vasir was down for good.


	2. Speed

**AN: **This was a drabble I wrote for Kirasdream to be the basis for a Kara/Garrus pic she's drawing me. It's set somewhere in the middle of Mass Effect two. I _might_ just be a little obsessed with action scenes right now. :P**  
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**2) Speed**

The Collector ambush had been quick. Before either Garrus or Kara could realize the 'distress call' from a downed Cerberus ship was a trap, they had been surrounded.

"Shit!" Kara said. "There's so many of the fuckers." Leaning up from cover, she sent a burst of submachine gun fire into the chest of a Collector that had been trying to flank her.

Garrus, hunkered down behind a nearby piece of debris, nodded. Had he not been focused on sighting down the head of another enemy in his scope, he would have remembered she could not see his response. He aimed, and pulled the trigger on his rifle; a Collector head exploded like a melon. Ejecting the spent heat sink, he said "We're pinned down. If we don't do something soon, Shepard, we're goners."

Kara laughed humorlessly. "Joker would kill me if I died on some barren-ass moon."

"You'd already be dead, remember," Garrus said. Even though most of his attention was fixed on blowing off the heads of the oncoming Collectors, he'd fought beside Kara often enough to be used to her habit of chatting during combat and could reply without distracting himself.

"Either way, fuck that," she replied. Her arm swirled in a blue corona, and a shockwave of biotic force sent three Collectors flying away. "Ha! Suck on that, bitches!" she laughed.

Garrus's mandibles lifted in a turian grin. "At least your new biotics seem useful." He blew the head off another Collector heading toward his position.

"Even Cerberus has to get something right every once in a while," Kara said. "Though, according to Miranda, me even having biotics means they fucked up." She finished off a Collector that hadn't been killed by her biotic attack with her SMG.

"And you could have butted heads with krogan _before_ they rebuilt you?"

Kara laughed again. "Good point. I guess they—"

"Augh!" Garrus's pained cry interrupted whatever quip she had been about to make. He doubled over, clutching his side.

"Garrus!" Kara looked over at him in alarm. He was bent over, holding a smoking gash in his side. Another glance toward the approaching Collectors told her that she and Garrus were now badly outnumbered.

Garrus raised his head weakly. "I'm alright, Shepard. Just a grazing shot. But we need to get out of here fast, or the next hit will certainly be worse." He kept a grip on his rifle, sighting down another target. But he must have been worse off than he wanted to admit, for the shot went wide, shooting over his target's shoulder. "Dammit!"

Kara attempted to call Joker on the com line once again, but with no luck. The Collectors had jammed the signal as soon as they sprung their trap. Not even EDI could hack through before Kara and Garrus would be fried by particle guns. "Dammit," she cursed under her breath. She chanced another look at the enemy forces. They were close now, and easily tripled her force.

It was then, as she watched what could easily be their doom advance, that she felt a rush of fire course through her. The hot-blooded love for the fight, that seemed more than a little krogan in nature, surged up in her.

They were completely outnumbered. Trapped and outmaneuvered. Facing impossible odds.

She grinned, and drew out her Claymore shotgun. "Hang on, Garrus," she said, a blue corona flaring up around her, "I'm getting us out of here."

Then she shot forward, propelled by the powerful biotics Cerberus had given to her, charging straight into the mass of enemy forces.

Later, in the med bay on the Normandy, Kara sat by Garrus's side as Dr. Chakwas patched him up. The beam had punched through the side of his armor, but had only glanced his plates.

Looking up at Kara, Garrus even managed a grin. "I thought we were dead for a minute there, but I guess I shouldn't have underestimated you, Shepard."

Kara grinned back at him, pride and relief vying for prominence in her expression. "Shit, it wasn't much." A mischievous twinkle appeared in her eye. "At least, not compared to taking down a Thresher Maw on foot, or fighting through a horde of geth _and_ a Colossus, or…"

Garrus's laugh interrupted her. "I get it, I get it. Still…taking down nearly twenty Collectors singlehandedly isn't something to sneeze at, either." He stared into her eyes, his expression turning serious. "There must have been something important on the line for you to fight like that."

Kara's smile grew larger. "There was," she said, leaning down to kiss his forehead.


End file.
